Robert Tanitch reviews Buckets at Orange Tree Theatre, Richmond, Surrey
It was great to see the Orange Tree packed with a young audience.
Bucket has so many slang meanings that I did wonder what I might be seeing in the round.
Time is running out for us all. Some people make a bucket list of the activities they wish to undertake before they (how can I put this delicately?) kick the bucket.
buckets (with a small b) is described as Adam Barnard’s first full-length play. But it’s not a full-length play; it’s a kaleidoscope, a bucket load of interconnected short scenes. Some are so short they are but moments, a couple of sentences, even just one sentence.
I was reminded of Caryl Churchill’s kaleidoscope of abrupt scenes, Love and Information, at the Royal Court three years ago.
A cast of six is directed by Rania Jumaily. They play any number of different roles without differentiating them. A community ensemble of singers joins them briefly.
Amongst the 27 items, two scenes on the parent/child relationship, one from the child’s point of view, the other from the parent’s, stand out.
A man takes a test and is delighted to hear he has scored 11,361; but he is not told out of how many.
A student tries to persuade his teacher to go abroad with him and help the starving in the Third World.
Barnard asks the audience whether they would be willing to be born, if they knew the terms and conditions in advance?
Some scenes work, some don’t. Either way, they must be murder to learn. Bits and pieces inevitably mean hits and misses.
Watching buckets (which is acted straight through in 90 minutes without an interval) I thought some of it would work better on film, as in the bungee jump, the suicide attempt, the collecting for charity and the hospital visit.
As they stand now, the various scenes, interesting though some are, they do not add up to a satisfying whole.
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